Inside the campaign-finance 'end run' that earned GOP an FEC fine

The Wyoming Republican Party secretly supported a 2016 Trump campaign “end run” around donation limitations without securing requisite authorization, according to a former official involved in the matter.

In the spring of 2017, several months after Donald Trump won the 2016 presidential election, the Wyoming Republican Party’s then-treasurer, Doug Chamberlain, received a letter from the Federal Elections Commission warning him of a potential campaign finance violation, he said.

The violation — which resulted in a $52,000 fine, and was first reported by WyoFile in May — cited the party’s failure to meet donation report deadlines for a series of unusual transfers between the Republican National Committee, the Wyoming Republican Party and the “Trump Victory Fund” political action committee, according to Chamberlain.

But there was a bigger problem: Chamberlain, who was responsible for signing off on all of the party’s financial activities and compliance with all FEC requirements per bylaws, was completely unaware of the arrangement, he said. According to Chamberlain, then-party chairman Matt Micheli had brokered a deal to pass donations made to the state party through to Trump’s campaign without informing Chamberlain or securing his approval.

Read more: https://www.wyofile.com/inside-the-campaign-finance-end-run-that-earned-gop-an-fec-fine/